Oct. 15--Wall Street did more than cross back over the 10,000 milestone Wednesday. It rediscovered feeling normal.

A few floor traders in New York clapped when buyers pushed the Dow Jones industrial average back over 10,000 for the first time in a year.

It was a clear sign markets are becoming ordinary again.

The Dow had to climb 53 percent in seven months to reach a level that Wall Street once celebrated with champagne and commemorative caps. Broader indexes also climbed to 2009 highs.

The average, which closed at 10,015.86, is still well below the old high of 14,198 back in 2007.

But Dow 10,000 also is comfortably above the 6,547 low point back in March.

Now the debates among analysts focus again on the routine. Will surprisingly strong corporate earnings last? Are interest rates heading higher to spoil the party? Has the economy turned upward, too?

In short, collapse of the financial system has largely left the conversation.

"We're where we might have been if we'd just had a recession," said Adam Bold, CEO of the Mutual Fund Store. "We've returned to normalcy."

Normal, however, means investors still face the risks that come with the reward that investments can bring.

Investors will notice those rewards as they open their quarterly retirement account statements arriving soon in the mail.

"They're breathing a little sigh of relief," financial planner Lynn Mayabb said of her clients at BKD Wealth Advisors in Kansas City.

Mayabb said investors who held on to and even added to a moderate mixture of stocks, bonds and cash may be getting back to where they started. Riskier portfolios probably have more damage to repair.

And as stocks have climbed a long way, bond investments did more than their usual part in restoring last winter's damage.

But investors' recent gains shouldn't be counted on to continue at this pace, advisers and money managers caution.

The steep rebound in investments came from extraordinarily depressed prices that were based on fears that the financial crisis could derail the financial system. And as that turned out not to be the case, markets shrugged off the fear.

"It was way overdone in March," said Dave Anderson, a portfolio manager for Financial Counselors Inc. in Kansas City.

Several local stocks have rebounded from the market's low point.

Owners of Sprint Nextel Corp., Cerner Corp., Kansas City Southern, Garmin Ltd., Waddell & Reed Financial Inc., Layne Christiansen Co. and Entertainment Properties Trust have seen their stocks more than double in price.